A couple of photos taken at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa before I head off to shoot today’s wedding. The sun is breaking through, hurrah!

Before this year, I only visited Ottawa once while living in Ontario, and that was just for the day in 2007 on the way back from a jazz festival weekend in Montreal. It’s taken me more than two years to pay another visit, but this is my third visit this year! Funny how things turn out. I was here very briefly with Lachlan in the spring, back again in July, and Ottawa changed its look again for the autumn. Somewhat chillier, but very bearable.

I met up with Zhu again and we fed our photography addiction together this afternoon, shooting mostly outside despite a grey sky. Personally, I am not against a grey sky, it means I have to be a bit more creative and point my camera selectively, whereas a sunny day is like shooting fish in a barrel. (An expression that doesn’t refer to a camera this time!) The major advantage to off-season photography is being able to go where I like without having to jostle anyone for prime position or wait for people to exit out of the frame. Try shooting the Parliament buildings people-free sometime! I still haven’t tried it, but there are always people milling about. Hmmm… I’ve not shot Ottawa in winter, maybe that’s next!

Tomorrow’s supposed to be a bit brighter, so we’ll see what Ottawa Day 2 brings. Today before I met up with Zhu I wandered the Byward Market, crossed the three bridges across the Ottawa River, and shot around the grounds of the Museum of Civilization. Apparently the workers there are on strike and have been since September 21! Although I am not a union worker by choice (evidenced by the fact that I resigned from a perfectly good position with the Ontario government at the beginning of last year without securing employment first), on principle I do not cross picket lines. To date, I have never crossed a picket line and I intend to keep it that way for as long as possible.

Still editing/uploading photos, so I’ll point you to the set as [thumbnails] or [slideshow] or browse in the Pictobrowser below (click to advance to the next photo or click the play button):

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I’ve edited and uploaded about a dozen photos so far [set here]. The weather was all over the place, but I had a great Saturday nevertheless!

More photos to come…

I can’t believe a week and a half has passed since I shot these photos, but the calendar doesn’t lie. I wanted to go to Montreal on the Friday, but we stayed in the city that night instead and pushed off on Saturday, heading eastward with no fixed itinerary except I had to return to Toronto on Sunday night and the furthest we’d probably drive would be Ottawa, where Lachlan’s friends lived and who were due to return from Scotland over the weekend. I had a look at the map and decided we would go slow, leave the 401, and explore Prince Edward County.

I had to laugh, because 17 years ago we also drove very slowly through southeastern Australia, taking two whole weeks to travel what would be 880kms along major highway — a single day’s drive. But we didn’t take the major highways then, and I decided we weren’t going to take them now.

We passed by many farms, but Lachlan was surprised to see virtually no-one in the fields. When I spotted cows (yes, cow-spotting is the new pastime these days!) I stopped the car so he could get a closer look at the breeds. I can’t even distinguish dog breeds, let alone cow breeds, so I was content to drive and take photos. In Australia, Lachlan did all the driving and mocked my navigational skills (granted, they were really lacking; I’m much better at it now!), but this time it was my turn to drive and mock his pronunciation of Canadian places. Vive le road trip!

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After more than a week of cameraphone photos, I am ready for some proper ones, aren’t you? I must be ‘at large’ again shortly, but here are a few from our weekend in Prince Edward County, which was cut rather short (for me) because I had to drive back to Toronto by myself on Sunday night after dinner to make an appointment downtown yesterday. Maybe this weekend I’ll get some time to upload more photos from the past week. For now, I leave you with scenes from the county’s main town, Picton, which calls itself Loyalist: